Weight loss comes with a lot of changes. Both mental and physical. Sometimes, they’re wonderful, and sometimes, they’re kind of depressing (realizations mainly).
One of the biggest changes is my closet. I mentioned to y’all that my sister gave me her “before” clothes. Well, shortly after that, a friend from college offered me some of her clothes (she’s lost a lot of weight as well!). I told her to send me whatever you don’t want, and she filled up two bins worth of clothes. Whoa…
So, I organized my closet, and quickly realized that I needed to pare down on some things. My “before” clothes. Some of those clothes in my closet were from college. So, I went through my closet, and got rid of everything but my size 26 “before” jeans. It filled up two bins and two garbage bags.
A friend from high school happened to message me about my clothes (since she saw my weight loss statuses on there), asking me if I had anything in her size, she’d love to have it. Well, after going through my closet, that friend is getting two bins of clothes. (I placed the larger sizes in the garbage bags for the clothes drop box down the street.)
It was weird packing those clothes away forever. Those clothes held memories (bad and good), and I could easily go in my closet and know what to wear. I memorized everything I had. It was easy to get dressed in the morning for work…VERY easy.
After paring down and re-organizing my closet, I looked in there and realized that I probably had more clothes in there now than I did to begin with (originally). Crazy. Then, a good blogger friend asked me if I’d like to have some of her “before” clothes. Her before clothes are smaller than the clothes I received from my sister and my other friend, so I definitely knew that I could eventually use them (I hope..), so she shipped those over to me (Thank God for flat rate boxes!). Knowing that I have clothes in sizes 10-14 now in my closet (with size 10 being my ultimate goal size…I think) is SO incredible. My closet is beyond full with the help of generous friends and family! It’s wonderful.
One of my biggest worries with my weight loss journey was clothes. Clothes aren’t cheap, and I work in a fairly professional environment 5 days/week. Yeah…work clothes, especially, aren’t cheap. So, I’m very thankful. As much as I want to shop and buy everything in a regular size, it’s definitely easy to steer clear of the mall knowing that I have all of these options.
The only negative feeling that I have is that everything in there is new (to me). These clothes are unfamiliar, and it’s weird to not really have memories from the clothes in my closet. Am I the only one who wears a shirt, and can almost instantly remember something that happened before while I was wearing that shirt? It will take some getting used to, but this is my life right now. Lots of unfamiliar changes.
I hear you on the familiar wardrobe. I always wore the same few outfits and would worry if I was wearing that same outfit/shirt/sweatshirt the last time I saw whomever I was going to be seeing and wondering what they would think. Did they even remember?
For about 5 yrs I worked a full-time job where I wore medical scrubs. Talk about not needing to worry about what you wore! Getting dressed was SO easy. So was packing on the pounds because I wore stretchy or drawstring pants every day!
Enter maternity clothes. More comfort. More familiarity. It was OK to get bigger in these clothes, it was expected.
Exit maternity clothes. Panic. My clothes don’t fit the same anymore. I don’t want to buy bigger (I’m NOT going to buy bigger). I’ve lost some weight but have more to lose. I want to clean out my closet in frustration because nothing fits but I know that I WILL get down to a smaller size and can wear some of my older clothes again. Clothes I haven’t worn in years.
ENJOY your new closet! Feel good that you’ve helped a friend with her needs.
Congratulations again on all of your weightloss!
TOTALLY with you. I have totes of too big clothes. And now a few are coming back (as loose maternity tops) and some clothes that fit in January are being packed away. And by “are being packed away” I mean, shoved to the back of my closet. I have to organize. I have a small dresser I plan to put my maternity items in (it used to be T-shirts only but I can put those in my closet on the unused shelf) but it’s so hard knowing in 6 months THOSE will be gone. So much transition- it’s all for good (weight loss, or babies) but clothes can kind of become an identity!!! Something fitting or not fitting can define us or how we feel (even though that’s not right!!!!) So… I FEEL YA. If you want to come organize mine I would be jussst fine with that because I’m over it!!! And my side of the room shows that, haha.